provisions, and their families. Their stock, also, is driven with the teams. Their wagons to them are a travelling home; many of them having a stove set, with pipe running through the top. They often travel far into the territory; it matters to them little how far, so that they get a location which pleases them. Then they build a cabin, and, with a fixed habitation, they will become the strength and sinew of the country. 22d. disturb us but little. . . There are ... continued rumors of new invasions, which About this time the people of Lawrence entered into a self defensive organization. The street broils and outrages were becoming so frequent their lives were in daily peril. As soon as the organization was complete, and their badges gave evidence of a secret society, the outrages ceased. . . . [November 18.] There has been a good deal of sickness in the country this fall,slow fever and chills. They prevail mostly in the low grounds near the rivers. We hear from some settlements, especially from those south on the Neosho, that sickness has laid its heavy hand on the strongest, and scarcely any have escaped the paralyzing blow. So far as we can learn, exposures, either necessary or unavoidable, have been the cause. Sara T. L. Robinson, Kansas; its Interior and Exterior Life (Boston, etc., 1856), 10-98 passim. The New England Emigrant Aid Company offered a prize for the song best suited to arouse Kansas immigrants, an offer characteristic of the methods of the association to kindle interest in the free-soil immigration to that territory. Miss Larcom's lyric won the prize. Later she enjoyed considerable reputation as a minor poet, and wrote several well-known patriotic poems during the Civil War.- Bibliography as in No. 36 above. Freedom is the noblest pay For the true man's toil. Ho! brothers! come, brothers! We'll sing upon the Kanzas plains Father, haste! o'er the waste There your fire-side altar stones Clad in triple mail of Right, Ho! brothers! come, brothers! We'll sing upon the Kanzas plains Mother, come ! here's a home Keep from taint the air, Come, mother! fond mother, List! we call to thee, We'll sing upon the Kanzas plains, A song of Liberty. Brother brave, stem the wave ! Up the dark Missouri flood Be your canvas spread. Sister true, join us too Where the Kanzas flows. Let the Northern lily bloom List! we call to thee, We'll sing upon the Kanzas plains, One and all, hear our call Aid us with the willing heart Millions glad shall flock. Ho! brothers! come, brothers! We'll sing upon the Kanzas plains, A song of Liberty. Lucy Larcom, Call to Kanzas (published in one sheet by the New England Emigrant Aid Company, [Boston, 1855]). 38. Pro-Slavery Emigration to Kansas (1855) BY COLONEL JOHN SCOTT Scott was a prominent citizen of St. Joseph, Missouri, and a militia officer. He went to Kansas for the elections of both November, 1854, and March, 1855, and presumably voted at both, although holding the office of city attorney in St. Joseph at the time. In the former election he was chosen judge of election by the crowd present at the polls; and he considered himself qualified to accept, because the night before he had engaged board at the settlement for a month. -Bibliography as in No. 36 above. I WAS present at the election of March 30, 1855, in Burr Oak precinct in the 14th district, in this Territory. I saw many Missourians there. There had been a good deal of talk about the settlement of Kansas, and the interference of eastern people in the settlement of that Territory, since the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska bill. It was but a short time after the passage of that act that we learned through the papers about the forming of a society in the east for the purpose of promoting the settlement of Kansas Territory, with the view of making it a free State. Missouri, being a slave State, and believing that an effort of that kind, if successful, would injure her citizens in the enjoyment of their slave property, were indignant, and became determined to use all means in their power to counteract the efforts of eastern people upon that subject. They were excited upon that subject, and have been so ever since. This rumor and excitement extended all over the State, and more particularly in the borders. The general rumor was that this eastern society was for no other purpose than making Kansas a free State. One great reason why we believed that was the only object of the society was, that we heard of and saw no efforts to settle Nebraska or the other Territories with free State men. The people of the south have always thought they have always been interfered with by the north, and the people of Missouri considered this the most open and bold movement the northern and eastern societies ever made. I am perfectly satisfied, and I have heard hundreds of Missourians lament that such a course had been pursued by the north, and gave it as their opinion that there would have been no excitement upon the subject of slavery, except for the extraordinary movement made by the north and east for the purpose of making Kansas a free State. Most of the slaves of the State of Missouri are in the western border counties, or the hemp growing portion of Missouri. The people of Missouri were a good deal excited just before the March election, because it had been so long postponed, and it was generally supposed that it was postponed in order to allow time. for eastern emigrants to arrive here, that they might control the elections. Everybody that I heard speak of it expressed that belief, both in and out of the Territory. The same rumors were in the Territory as in Missouri. Immediately preceding that election, and even before the opening of navigation, we had rumors that hundreds of eastern people were in St. Louis, waiting for the navigation of the river to be opened, that they might get up to the Territory in time for the election, and the truth of these rumors was established by the accounts steamboat officers afterwards brought up of the emigrants they had landed at different places in and near the Territory, who had no families and very little property, except little oil cloth carpet sacks. For some two or three weeks before the election the rumor was prevalent that a good many eastern people were being sent here to be at the elections, and then were going back. There was a general expression of opinion that the people of Missouri should turn out and come to the Territory, and prevent this illegal voting by force, if necessary. We regarded this as invasion of the northern people of a Territory which was contiguous to Missouri, for the purpose of controlling the institutions of the Territory, and the defeat of the objects of the Kansas-Nebraska bill. I do not recollect as I ever heard any Missourians advocate the policy of Missourians going over to that election and voting, in the absence of this eastern emigration about the time of the election, except, perhaps, General Stringfellow, who advocated the doctrine that the Missourians had the right to go there any time to vote, and, perhaps, urged them to come for that purpose. It was determined by the Missourians that if the eastern emigrants were allowed to vote, we would vote also, or we would destroy the poll books and break up the elections; and the determination is, that eastern people shall not be allowed to interfere and control the domestic institutions of Kansas, if the Union is dissolved in preventing it, though we are willing that all honest, well-meaning settlers shall come and be admitted to all the equality of the other citizens. I went to the Burr Oak precinct with a company of other Missourians, with no arms myself, and I saw one gun in the party, and a few pistols and side arms. The determination of the people of Missouri was to interfere with no one except this boat load of eastern emigrants which was expected at that precinct, and if they arrived we determined, if strong enough, to march them back, to the tune of the Rogue's March, to the river, and make them get on the boat they got off. If we were not strong enough and they were allowed to vote, we were determined to vote too. . . . I did not see the slightest effort made on the 30th of March to interfere with the voters of the district, and there was no disturbance in regard to the election. . . . I do not think the Missourians would ever have got excited about Kansas, but for the rumors concerning eastern emigrants. The [most] extraordinary efforts made by the eastern people, except these emigrant aid societies, that I have heard of, is the newspaper reports of men, rifles, and means being sent out here, as they say, to defend themselves, but, as we think, to control the elections here. If the Missouri compromise had not been repealed by the Kansas-Nebraska act, I think Kansas Territory would have been made a slave State, as most of the prominent men of Missouri considered that compromise repealed since 1850, and I have no doubt that the feeling in regard to Kansas then would have |